In addition to providing an enhanced view of police interactions with the public, there is another benefit of police officers being equipped with body cameras: researchers will be able to study video and audio footage to help create more realistic training scenarios for officers. Researchers from UCLA will pull video and audio material from up to 100 officers at an undisclosed police agency.

"While we focus attention on things that escalated all the way to extreme outcomes, we know a lot less about other events," said Jeff Brantigham, an anthropologist from UCLA, in a statement published by the MIT Technology Review. "Things that went down a dangerous path and ended up being okay. Why did it end up that way? That would provide a huge benefit in terms of training."

The Obama Administration has promised $75 million in funding for body cameras, as many police departments across the country show interest in deploying them.